


Chara in Neutral Ground

by SeventhAgent



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, Dark fic, Demonic Possession, Short One Shot, Spoilers - Undertale Genocide Route, abusive relationship subtext, after the neutral run
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-07
Updated: 2018-03-07
Packaged: 2019-03-28 04:35:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13896384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SeventhAgent/pseuds/SeventhAgent
Summary: Frisk is never, ever going to go back. The demon wants them to, but they won't. It's always the same now. Even if they miss the flowers and the friends and the sunlight. Even if they desperately want to escape the black void of neutral ground....





	Chara in Neutral Ground

_Don’t you miss the flowers, Frisk?_

The words of the demon inflated grotesquely, pumped themselves full of blood and fat, consumed the blackness with their letters. Frisk took a deep breath (not that there was air) and hugged his legs (not that his body existed here in the darkness between endings). Nothing but what we acknowledge. No pain. No thought. No words.

_The flowers, Frisk. The smell of flowers. Or food, or drink, or anything you can think. Look. Look._

Lies, lies, lies. Nothing to look at. Frisk wondered if they even had eyes, if they’d been taken from him too in the neutral place after the phone call. They had reached for them after all sound but the voice (the demon) faded into nothing. Felt them. Winced as their hands touched the soft wet jelly of their eyes. _I exist_ , thought the young child Frisk. _I exist, and so do_ _es he_.

He. She. It. The demon. The hungry thing. The bottomless stomach that Frisk could feel hungering, begging, screaming inside of their torso.

_You can go back, you know. Frisk…you can take it all back._

That was true, at least. Frisk had seen enough to know how true it was. Every single possibility was accounted for in Frisk’s head—reels and gag reels of memories, perfect situations, playful murders and tear-stained apologies. Say-you’re-sorries-and-reset-and-slice-you-opens-till-the-novelty-bleeds-out.

Sure, Frisk could take it back. But…but…

_But you’re stalling. Why are you stalling? It’s all right there. Feel it in your hands. Can’t you feel it?_

Trickling through their fingertips, oh. Possibilities bright, lightheaded oh god all there all powerful the bubbling over borrowed kettle of someone else someone watching through the walls. Someone who could twist everything—demon, Frisk, the world itself—and return to a world of light without a second thought.

But the someone was part of Frisk, no matter how much they wanted to scream and push it away. The someone. The watching. The laughing and playing. The watcher in the walls who played and played game after game till the playing got pale and the killing called, waiting crimson, tapping crested fingers and oh god Frisk could feel the need to play, to squint and jump and kill even as the play printed over one more time.

_They’re waiting. Tapping._

Raindrop memories. Slow. Steady…

 _Any_ _time you wanted, you could go back._

And they’d play. They’d both play. But no matter what they did, it would always be the same ending. It was unstoppable now. Frisk and the demon were bound together. In the end, all acts of kindness would be undone.

Frisk had seen it before.

The demon-strings had pulled the knife from beneath his bed and followed Toriel.

The demon had said hello to its adopted mother.

 _I won’t this time. I promise I won’t. I think I remember what it’s like to be human now. Oh, sweetness. Oh, kindness. Oh, everything. Everything I forgot_.

And in the void between worlds, in the Neutral ground, Frisk cried for himself and cries for the demon. Cried for the single monster they killed, a target chosen by cold mathematics. This is the one, Frisk thought, I care about the least.

Now, this place.

 _I want to change_ , the demon whispered.

“I know,” said Frisk.

_Frisk._

Void. Raindrop memories. Flashes of smiles. Bursts of dust.

_Frisk, please._

Jokes. Phone calls. Butterscotch-cinnamon.

_It’ll be different._

A ring of tears floating around them, the child and the demon, weightless.

 _Frisk,_ said the demon. _Don’t you miss the flowers?_

**Author's Note:**

> I actually wrote most of this fic three years ago, right after playing Undertale for the...second time? Third time? It's been sitting on my desktop, and up until now I've been too lazy to give it a proper ending. No idea why. I quite like this piece, and I hope you did too.
> 
> The neutral endings don't get nearly enough love. Then again, our mutual friend Frisk may not be quite as fond of them as I am.


End file.
